A Handful of Emotions
by Ebony10
Summary: A collection of oneshots or drabbles... centered around the team. Another in the Handful series. Some VP/R and Jisbon. Can't resist. ;P
1. Love

A very short one. Rather obvious (as he was in the Color series). I just feel that, though he and Van Pelt have depth, they are just a little more obvious and translucent than the other characters in the show so the _Handful_ series reflects that. Hope you enjoy this very short short. ;P

**A Handful of Emotions**

**Chapter One: Love**

* * *

Wayne Rigsby had never been one to say the L-word to any woman aside from his mother. He'd had relationships. Plenty of them, but never very serious. Never serious enough that he had fallen so hard. He had never seen himself with any woman for the rest of his life.

Until Grace.

In high school, he was too busy trying to help his mom out, trying to keep the bills paid and the bruises gone. In college, he had his hands full with sports and keeping the grades. Admittedly, he also had his hands full of air-headed sorority sisters who were nothing more than a good time. Or a way to pass the time.

He was fair about it. All the girls (it was hard to call those kind of college students women) knew the deal from the get go. No hard feelings.

Even after college, he hadn't seriously dated. Well, it wasn't serious for him. He just didn't feel that 'something special' that he had heard about. Okay, maybe it was stupid. Guys didn't think that way. But his mother had always droned about it—those butterflies you felt in your stomach, the crazy urges to do whatever you could for them, be whatever they needed. He knew his mother had settled for his father. What a mistake that had turned out to be. And Rigsby could learn from others' mistakes. He was holding out for the best. Like his mother should have.

And, for him, the best was Grace Van Pelt. She was his serious.

Oh, it had been lust at first sight. No doubt about it. But as the days turned to weeks, which turned to months, he had fallen hard. She was lovely on the inside and the out. Strong, kind, intelligent.

She took his breath away.

And he had tried so hard to keep it to himself, but he just couldn't. He had never felt this way about anyone before and it was too strong to contain. Too strong to keep to himself.

He loved her. He wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. Work be damned.

Now to convince her she wanted the same thing.


	2. Determination

A Handful of Emotions

**Chapter Two: Determination**

********************************************************************  
**

Grace Van Pelt had plans. She had made it this far (and it _was_ far in so many ways) from her small town. Now she was in a big city. An agent bringing about justice.

Just the thought made her smile.

And she couldn't wait to keep pushing the envelope.

She wanted to show her boss how capable she was. To prove that she deserved to be on the team of Senior Agent Teresa Lisbon. Van Pelt had been both excited and wary when she had learned that her supervisor was to be a woman. She had known then that it could go a few different ways.

Her boss could have been a butch, hard-ass agent with a skewed perspective who tried to hide everything womanly about herself.

She could have been a coquettish woman who slept her way up the law enforcement ladder.

Van Pelt thanked God almost everyday that her boss had been Lisbon. Tough, no-nonsense, and by the book, but also nurturing, just, non-biased. Not afraid of her femininity, but not flaunting it. Hard-working.

Lisbon deserved her own unit. And Van Pelt lost no time in setting the senior agent up as her own role model. Someone to look to as an example of what she could be.

She wanted to prove that she was useful to the team, to the Bureau, specifically to _Lisbon's_ team.

Someday, she wanted to make her own space as the head of a unit.

But she also had other aspirations. Ones that fell outside of work. Ones that could only be described as personal.

Mainly: Wayne Rigsby.

Jane had been right. Rigsby _was_ an excellent lover. Not too demanding. Attentive.

But Van Pelt was determined to push past her own problems, to learn how to trust, how to love. Because she knew the large, caring man loved her. And, even though it scared her at first, she now reveled in it. Found it a comfort to know that he'd be there for her.

She was determined to make their relationship work. And to make it work with their careers. If they could just hold off a little longer. Surely there would be some kind of avenue. A promotion? A transfer?

And, really, she didn't mind transferring. But she wasn't ready yet. She still had a lot more to learn from the team. Cho, Rigsby, Jane, Lisbon.

She had a feeling that no one in the Bureau quite had the mix Lisbon did. And she wanted to benefit from that mix for as long as possible.

Van Pelt had plans.

And she was determined to make them reality.


	3. Frustration

Lol, this is almost turning into an ode to Lisbon fic. Sorry about that. I'm just really liking her lately, I suppose. Sorry about taking so long to update!! A Handful of Emotions

**Chapter Three: Frustration**

* * *

Kimball Cho hid his emotions well. If asked, one would likely describe him as stoic. Deadpan. Monotonous.

And he was, no doubt. But underneath all of that, Cho sometimes had a hard time forgetting the troubled teen that once lived in his body. The one who hated to be confined. With a strict (though sometimes warped) sense of what was right and wrong—and a penchant for ignoring convention when it came to acting on that sense.

Even though his expression never showed it, there were those tough days where it was all he could do to rein in that teen. To stop the pent up energy from seeping out. Cho's refuge was often the rulebook. Sometimes he was just so _frustrated _with the world. With everything.

The killers.

Circumstances.

Crimes.

Things that weren't crimes, but should be.

At those times, Lisbon provided the best sort of influence, calm and rational.

And Rigsby, with his guileless innocence. Jane, even with his sneaky plans and devious ways, had wormed his way under Cho's skin and provided a light-heartedness that had never been prominent in his childhood. That helped to ease the sharpness of that frustration.

And Van Pelt's quiet caring became something steady that everyone in the team could rely on. That Cho could rely on.

It was a rainy afternoon—not storming, just clouds hiding the sun in a light splattering of water—when Cho realized that his time with this unit (this small, but close-knit unit which had become like a family in a way) had been slowly easing tension. Not an earth-shattering realization. The stars didn't fall from the sky. The rain didn't stop and the sun didn't beam rays of light down on him.

But he felt something shift inside. And he knew that, even if he looked exactly the same to the team, he was different. Better. The frustration was finally, _finally_, to a point where he wouldn't feel trapped, wouldn't have that urge to lash out.

It would never be gone. His job was not the sort that made people forget the dredges of society (quite the opposite, actually), but what remained was a normal, manageable sort of frustration.

The kind that people dealt with all the time.

The kind that would dissipate with a subtly encouraging word from Lisbon. A clap on the back from Rigsby. A ridiculous folded piece of paper from Jane that was somehow supposed to look like a llama. Fresh baked cookies from Van Pelt.

Everyone would still describe him as stoic. Deadpan. Monotonous.

But Cho knew that, inside, he was far from one color. Far from one emotion. And, thanks to his unit (his family), he was no longer as intensely violent on the inside as his outside was still.

Amazing how many shades of one emotion (frustration) there could be.

As he watched the rain turn to drizzle, he rather thought it was like the weather. Always changing. Cause and effect.

Hidden currents.

Light and dark.

Cold and hot.

He saw the first flicker of sun from behind a cloud and turned back to his book.

He was getting sentimental in his old age.

Thank God Jane couldn't really read minds.


	4. Anger

This is a little fragmented, but that is because I feel that Lisbon's feelings must be very fragmented (and confused) inside—especially because she keeps things so tightly in. Hope it's not too bad, though! A Handful of Emotions

**Chapter Four: Anger**

* * *

Teresa Lisbon hated losing control. And anger—well, letting her anger loose—was the number one way to do so.

It used to scare her sometimes. To realize just how _angry _she was after her mother was killed. She'd sit in class, gazing at the chalkboard, looking studious, but inside she was a writhing mass of anger. But she held it in. Hid it from her teachers. From her family. Sucked it up, pushed it down, and took care of her brothers. Of her father.

She knew the cost of anger.

Her father had taught her that.

It was easy to make excuses: he didn't realize what he was doing; it was the alcohol, the grief; he just hadn't come to terms yet.

She had never understood how his coming to terms involved using his children as a punching bag. Oh, she had told Dr. Carmen about the beating of her brother, but she had left some important things out.

How that was the last time she had ever let her father lay a hand on them. How saving them had broken something in her. How she felt anger well each and every time her father laid a hand on her in violence. How she had to ruthlessly control that anger.

And even now, she was cool and calm. Collected. She had gone through a lot of things in her life, especially since she'd started at the CBI, but she worked hard to present a front to others. Nothing fazed her. Or so they thought…

So it was a surprise to her when Patrick Jane got under her skin. To the point of making her lose her temper. Most of the time they bantered, he badgered, she outlined rules.

But every once in a while…

Well, he was the only one who could make her lose her temper like that. Who could loosen her tight control.

And that scared her. She had worked hard for that control and she couldn't understand what was so special about Patrick Jane that he could chip away at the dam holding it all in.

The moment she realized that, she knew just how dangerous he was to her.

She didn't know what kind of person she was without those barriers.

She didn't _want_ to know what kind of person she was without those barriers.

She was scared that she wouldn't like that person once exposed.

She was scared that it would be everything she stood against. Anger. Violence. Rash actions.

After a while, she realized that Jane could chip away at her, that she could release that anger and maybe…just maybe, she wouldn't hate herself.

The eyes that stared back at her in the mirror were tortured, sad, and sometimes angry.

But they were familiar.

And she wasn't so scared to get to know herself.

But she was still scared of the tremble that coursed through her around Jane. It had nothing to do with losing her control of her temper. Not anymore.

And that was the most terrifying thing of all.


	5. Envy

Last of the emotions. Hope you've liked this little set. I'm working on quite a doozy of a story. I'll probably post the first chapter soon. Blame Tromana. And, of course, there will be more of the _Handful_ series eventually. What next? _A Handful of Nursery Rhymes_ perhaps?A Handful of Emotions

**Chapter Five: Envy**

* * *

Most people would think that Patrick Jane was envious of those happy families, those _whole_ families who still had the chance to revel in the presence of one another. And sometimes he was. But now, after all these years, he had the presence of mind to feel happiness for them. To hope that they realized how lucky they were.

Most of them didn't.

And Jane knew that some people thought he was envious of some of the criminals—_murderers_—that they caught. The ones who committed crimes in revenge. The ones who had the chance to seek vengeance. The ones who were successful in that venture.

And at first he thought he was. But after watching so many of them go through it, he was wondering if it was what he wanted. What he needed. Oh, he would still have justice. No mistake about that. But did he want to do it in a way that would ruin his life? Did he want to help Red John pound that final nail into his coffin?

He still didn't have an answer to those questions and he figured that was why he was no longer envious of those criminals when they sat in the chair across from him, the harsh light of the interrogation room glinting off their broken eyes.

Yes, Jane thought he knew what envy was. Watching a little blond girl at the park run up to her father, tugging his hand to drag him to the swings. Brightly lit Christmas trees in windows. Clumsily carved jack-o-lanterns lining the porches of suburbia.

He knew that envy well.

But as he watched a small town sheriff make a play for Lisbon, he realized that he could still feel a very different kind of envy. To Jane's surprise, Lisbon smiled back. Distantly, the consultant took note of the attractive (to a woman, at least) slant of the man's shoulders and the tousled brown hair.

That was when he realized that this new envy could intensify.

Ten fold.

And he had no idea what to do about it.


End file.
